Belle Rose: A Romance of the Cloak and Sword — page 190: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

176 A SOUL IN PAIN. **T have made this appointment,’’ she said to him, ‘‘to speak to you of a child who no longer has a father and whom its mother wishes to confide to you.”’ ‘‘In communicating to you the mission which Monsieur d’Assonville has charged me,’’ said Belle-Rose, ‘‘I have never pretended to deprive you of the right to see and embrace your son. Can we not together watch over him??’’ Madame de Chateaufort shook her head. ‘*Yesterday such a proposition would have delighted me; but to-day——”’ The voice of Madame de Chateaufort was so deeply de- spondent that Belle-Rose took her hand. ‘‘Genevieve,’’ he said to her, ‘‘forget that you are a woman by recollecting that you are a mother.’”’ | ‘‘T can forget nothing,’’ said she. ‘‘You wish us to watch togéther over this child. Alas! can we? When you see him smiling between us, what kind of a look will vou have for the mother? Stay, Jacques, yesterday I under- stood everything. Misfortune pursues me! When Monsieur d’Assonville died, I was there! When your father’s blood flowed, I was there! The reproach to me in your looks was also in your heart, and now, whatever you do, the idea of murder will always abide in my memory! Between you and me there are too many misfortunes; there is-your father, there is Gaston!’’ Belle-Rose lowered his head. Each word of Genevieve was an arrow in his heart. ‘‘You are silent, Jacques,’’ said she, ‘‘and I no longer pity myself. You have pardoned me.’”’ As this last word fell from her lips a terrible cry rent the air. Both of them trembled; but this nameless cry hag traversed space like a bullet; everything had again become calm and silent. By an instinctive movement, Genevieve had drawn near Belle-Rose. ‘*Jacques,’’ she said to him, taking one of his hands be- tween hers, ‘‘tell me at least that you will teach my son to | love me? When he sees me he smiles at me; he has divine caresses for my lips; he extends over my faults his inno- cence like a cloak; his little hands cling to my neck, and, when he calls me, it seems to me that the benediction of God descends upon me.’”’ Genevieve wept, her face bowed over Belle-Rose’s hand. ‘*He will love you! he will love you! how could Gaston’s son fail to love you?’’ exclaimed Belle-Rose, beside him- self. ; Another cry more horrible still resounded. It was a comicbooks.com